


Safe

by ThetaSigma



Category: Law & Order: SVU
Genre: Established Relationship, Humor, Light Angst, M/M, Middle of the Night Feels, Rafael isn't ready for this but he tries
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-03
Updated: 2017-09-03
Packaged: 2018-12-23 06:45:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,598
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11984352
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThetaSigma/pseuds/ThetaSigma
Summary: Rafael would never admit to anyone he felt safer when his cop boyfriend slept in the same bed as him. Anyway, he doesn'tneedSonny, he tells himself firmly.Until maybe he does.He’s lying on his back, regulating his breathing, trying a relaxation exercise Sonny taught him. Then he hears it. The door to the apartment, opening softly, quietly, cautiously.





	Safe

Rafael will never admit that having Sonny around at night makes him feel safer. He doesn’t _need_ it, he tells himself sternly, he got through decades without having a hot cop boyfriend playing the protective role, so as he rolls over in the empty bed, he reminds himself he is perfectly fine alone. Sonny’s been gone a few days on a UC operation, and Rafael is _perfectly fine_ , thank you.

He is certainly not jumping at the noises in the apartment block around him.

Even if he has been getting hang-up calls again lately. Another gang case, another bunch of bad guys put away, another bunch of hang-up calls. It’s routine by now, it should be, he has a whole filing cabinet drawer dedicated to death threats in case the police ever need to look into it. Carmen knows exactly where to look for each one by now, just in case. Sonny doesn’t. Because Sonny would worry and would try to have a protective detail on him after each hang-up call and Rafael doesn’t need that.

So Rafael doesn’t tell Sonny. 

But tonight, he does kind of miss his cop boyfriend, who has a gun and the training to use it, who makes Rafael feel safe even when Sonny is dead to world, who can go from fast asleep to alert in five seconds flat, ready to deal with any danger. (It happened _once_ , when Rafael had snuck out of bed for a midnight snack and stubbed his toe on the way back in. He had dropped the bowl, which had promptly shattered. Sonny had bolted upright and reached for his weapon immediately, cautiously, calling out in the dark to find out what was going on. Rafael had been equal parts embarrassed, impressed, and aroused by the whole incident, especially Sonny’s reaction). 

He tells himself it’s fine. These people probably don’t know where he lives – he’s moved since the last bad round of death threats, moved to a new place with Sonny, and he hasn’t been dumb enough to give out his address again. Somehow he doesn’t think his sunshine would like that. Rafael knows Sonny would protect him with everything, but he doesn’t actually want Sonny to have to do that.

He groans and tosses in his bed, willing sleep to come. The previous nights hadn’t been so bad, but tonight he’d gotten a threatening letter at the office, some amateur job, and he is worked up. No news from Sonny, nothing from Liv, even, and on top of the threats, it’s more than he wants to deal with.

All he wants now, after midnight, is some sleep before he has to deal with work in the morning, and it’s not coming to him. Maybe he _should_ cut back on his coffee intake.

He’s lying on his back, regulating his breathing, trying a relaxation exercise Sonny taught him. Then he hears it. The door to the apartment, opening softly, quietly, cautiously.

Rafael is on red alert. His heart hammers in his chest, his breathing speeds up. _Fuck_. Not tonight. Please, not tonight. Not when Sonny isn’t home. Rafael fumbles for his phone, panic rising in his chest. He really hadn’t given any credence to those threats, hadn’t even warned Liv about them. He debates calling 911, but his fingers hover over his contacts, and before he knows it, he selects Liv’s number.

It rings. It rings, and his heart is in his throat now, pounding. Soft footsteps in his living room, muffled. Rafael rushes to their closet. Sonny keeps a back-up gun, for safety. Locked up, also for safety, but Rafael knows the code.

He doesn’t know how to shoot. He’s never had to. He’s never had to aim, to fire, to pull the trigger, and he knows, he _knows_ it’s not as simple as just pointing and pulling but he can’t be useless, he has to do something. 

He takes it out of the gunsafe with shaking hands. It’s loaded, thank God, because while Rafael has seen Sonny load his gun hundreds of times, quick, practiced, easy movements, there’s no way Rafael could ever replicate them. Rafael looks at it helplessly, wondering if there’s a safety and if he has to do anything with it, but he doesn’t know. He wishes now he had asked his boyfriend for a lesson in this, a basic ‘how to use the gun’ lesson, but he’s never needed a gun before, his words have always been enough, and Sonny’s always been there with his gun and badge just in case.

He’s not here now, Rafael reminds himself, so he has to do this himself.

_‘Barba, what is it?’_ Liv’s voice in his ear. Right, the phone.

‘There’s someone in my apartment,’ Rafael whispers. ‘I have Carisi’s back-up gun, but I don’t know how to use it.’

_‘Barba, I’m 30 minutes away. I’m on my way, but you need to call 911.’_

Right. Of course he does. He’s worried, one of his more recent cases involved his local precinct. He hopes they’ll respond anyway.

The footsteps are getting nearer. Rafael quickly punches in 911 and drops the phone, trusting that they’ll come despite his lack of a response. 

His door starts to open, again quietly and cautiously. Rafael holds up the gun, willing his hands to stop shaking. He swallows hard and demands in his best courtroom, ‘don’t fuck with me’ voice, “Put your hands up!”

Two hands appear in the half-open doorway. 

A voice starts squawking through the phone. _“… Is everything okay? Please advise us of the nature of your emergency. Hello? Hello? Can you hear me? Please stay on the line. Repeat, stay on the line. We have units responding to your emergency now.”_

The door starts opening again, the hands leading the way. Rafael steadies the gun. “Slowly!” he barks.

“Jesus, okay!” a voice answers immediately. “What’s going on?”

And Rafael recognizes that voice immediately, recognizes it as the door opens and his Sonny walks in, befuddled, in jeans and a sweatshirt, his hands up in surrender. Rafael lowers the gun immediately.

“ _Sonny,_ ” he says in relief. “You scared the _shit_ out of me.”

“Rafi,” Sonny says simply. “Unless you’re ready to shoot, your finger shouldn’t be on the trigger of a gun. Ever. You mind taking it off?” Of course that’s what he focuses on, Rafael’s trigger discipline.

Rafael hurriedly takes his fingers away from the trigger and holds the gun helplessly, not quite sure how to hand off a loaded gun harmlessly. He wants to toss it aside, but he’s seen too many movies where the gun goes off when tossed and doesn’t know that it doesn’t work that way. 

“Raf. You mind if I take my gun back now?” Sonny asks bemusedly. “I mean, I’m pretty sure I know how to handle it.” Now that Rafael doesn’t seem in imminent danger of shooting anything, Sonny is easy, calm, _amused_. He’s holding his hand out gently, as if Rafael might change his mind about this.

“ _Please_.” 

Sonny easily takes the gun out of Rafi’s hand and locks it back up in the safe. “Now,” he says. “What…”

The voice from 911 is still talking. _“Hello? The police should be there in the next minute. Hello?”_

Sonny scoops up the phone before Rafael can. “Hello!” he says brightly. “This is Detective Dominick Carisi Jr of the NYPD, Special Victims Unit, badge number 0188. There is currently no emergency at this apartment; I returned home from an undercover operation and accidentally surprised my boyfriend. … Yes, I understand the police will be here. … Yes, of course I will be happy to make a statement to them. Thank you.”

He turns to look at Rafael. “Rafi. You wanna tell me why this scared you so much?”

Rafael doesn’t. He doesn’t want to admit that he got this worked up about some stupid hang-up calls and a letter that means nothing, he doesn’t want to admit that he felt less safe without his cop in their bed, he doesn’t want to admit that when he heard the soft footsteps he panicked and didn’t know what to do. He doesn’t want to admit any of this to Sonny, who probably would’ve been calm under these circumstances and rational and would’ve known how to handle a gun or….

But Sonny’s not looking at him with pity, just soft concern, and Rafael sighs. “I’ve been getting hang-up calls again,” he admits. “Nothing serious. I didn’t know you were coming home tonight, and when I heard the door opening, I thought… I thought it was someone else. I… I panicked.”

Sonny doesn’t judge him. Not for a second. Sonny pulls Rafael into a hug and murmurs in his ear soft words of encouragement, understanding, comfort. “I’m sorry I scared you like that. You were good tonight,” he says. “Very scary. You handled it well.”

And that makes Rafael swell with pride, just a bit, because he doesn’t feel like he handled it well, but his sunshine is looking at him proudly, and it’s hard not to believe him. 

“You called 911 and you had my gun out and ready right away,” Sonny continues. “No one had to know that you couldn’t actually hit your target.” He sneaks a look at Rafael. “I think I’ll give you some lessons, honey. At least basic trigger discipline.”

Rafael gives a shaky laugh at that and lets himself be held. In a minute, they’ll have to deal with the police, with calling Liv back, but right this second, he lets himself be held by his boyfriend and feel safe.


End file.
